


Every stumble and each misfire

by wolfsan11



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Brief reference to S2, First Kiss, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Happy Ending, Hopeful Ending, Hurt Shiro (Voltron), Hurt/Comfort, Let Shiro rest 2k17, M/M, POV Keith (Voltron), Pre-Kerberos Mission, Pre-Relationship, Protective Keith (Voltron), Shiro is very stressed, Time Travel, why are there no tags for break downs wth
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-27
Updated: 2017-04-27
Packaged: 2018-10-24 14:50:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,775
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10743903
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wolfsan11/pseuds/wolfsan11
Summary: There's two months left before the Kerberos Mission is set to launch; Shiro isn't doing so well with all the pressure setting in. Keith tries to help, but there’s far more going on beneath the surface of what he sees.





	Every stumble and each misfire

**Author's Note:**

  * For [heyitscmei](https://archiveofourown.org/users/heyitscmei/gifts).



> @heyitscmei, HAPPY BIRTHDAY LOVE <3 <3 This one's for you :D I hope you had a wonderful day yesterday!! You don't know how lucky and honoured I feel to be your friend. You're like this amazing, multi-talented and super hard-working person who has hard times but still manages to spring past it all, still writes and draws the fluffiest and sweetest Sheith ever, and I can't tell you much I appreciate and love you. You're the representation of the fact that hope is always more powerful, that writing good and happy things is just as good as writing the sad and angsty.  
> So while this isn't that exactly, I still hope you enjoy it :) Happy Birthday again <3

It’s 8 in the morning and Keith is already done with the day.

“Tell me again how breakfast is ‘important for your health’, Shiro,” Keith mutters to himself, as he leans against the corridor wall across from the mess. Alone. Without Shiro.

Because the person in question is late of course.

That in itself isn’t odd; Shiro’s reputation for being a nocturnal sack of trash in the mornings was only rivalled by Keith’s infamy for being prickly and uninviting. But he was cutting it closer than usual.

And then there’s the matter of his promise.

Keith sighs, shifting his weight, irritably fidgeting with the collar of his uniform. He stares down at his unpolished, scuffed boots and tries to imagine the lecture he’ll get for them. It doesn’t quite work to distract him from the thoughts swirling in his head.

A year ago, he would have been perfectly content with being left to his own devices, to let others assume his interests and simply leave him be. A year ago, he would have had no problem keeping himself busy.

A year ago, he’d met Shiro, and now everything was different.

It probably said a lot about him, how much he’d changed because of a single boy’s friendly smile and extended hand. Except now, ever since Shiro’d been selected for the Kerberos mission, Keith had been seeing less and less of him than he was strictly happy about.

If Shiro wasn’t absorbed in poring over pages and pages of data, he was logging endless hours in the Kerberos mission simulator reserved solely for the use of their crew, working tirelessly until he’d memorized flight patterns and every possible scenario; until he could trace the path with his ship and touchdown on the moon with unerring accuracy and poise.

He’d return to his room an exhausted mess, falling into bed without dinner unless Keith brought it to him and prodded him to eat. And then he’d do it all over again the next day, and the next, and the next.

Shiro was driving himself into the ground, because that’s what he did and that’s what was expected of him, and still, he would not get a chance to rest, because today...today, he was leaving the Garrison.

Come evening, Shiro would be grabbing his belongings and heading off to the main military base and two months later…Kerberos.

The thought leaves a dent in his heart when he envisions the imminent future before him, a Shiro-shaped hole at his side. It’s an understandably large hole.

‘ _He said we’d eat together,_ ’ Keith reminds himself, ‘ _He’ll be here soon._ ’

The stream of cadets walking in and out from the mess hall is already slowing to a trickle as they split off for their lectures, but Shiro is still nowhere to be seen.

Discomfort pinches him for a moment, and it feels like everyone is staring at him as they pass by, probably wondering why he’s standing there like some kind of demented gargoyle watching over its prey. He knows he’s being paranoid, but he resolutely believes that the situation calls for it.

Keith gives it five more minutes before he gives in with a huff and sets off to find Shiro.

They could grab something to eat from the commissary later anyway.

 

* * *

 

“Shiro? You there?” Keith raps his knuckles against the door, and waits.

No answer.

Shiro probably wasn’t in. He could have forgotten about their plan and ran off for his duties or something. Keith could be worrying over nothing.

He chews at his lips and wonders if he’s maybe not being a little unreasonable. Wonders if Shiro isn’t fed up with him trailing after the older boy like a puppy, of him being a little too attach-

Keith shakes his head sharply, trying to dismiss the melancholy draping over his mind.

 _‘He’s a good person. He’s a good friend. Trust that,_ ’ he tells himself firmly (if not a little helpless, because when had he decided Shiro was always worth trusting? When had that happened? When had it become mor-).

He focuses on the door and knocks again, just to make sure. This time he hears a sound from within, muffled slightly by the barrier.

“Shiro?”

There’s no response for a long, long moment. Then-

“Keith?”

Keith blinks, caught-off guard by how subdued the voice seems. He clears his throat lightly before calling out again.

“I- yeah. Can I, uh, can I come in?” he asks, rather awkwardly. He hasn’t actually had to ask in a while, but…something about the whole affair is throwing him off his usual comfort in everything regarding Shiro.

Shiro takes too long to respond again, eventually calling out a hesitant affirmative.

The door slides open, revealing a dark room with the thick curtains still drawn, blocking out the daylight. Keith sucks in a deep breath, feeling an itch at the nape of his neck. His instincts are prodding at him suddenly, urgent but indecipherable, so he squashes them down and crosses the threshold into the room. It was Shiro. There was nothing to fear.

He squints through the dimness as the door shuts behind him, idly thinks of turning on the lights. When he spots Shiro, his mind goes blank.

Shiro’s in his uniform, the new one he’d been presented with after his promotion (and Keith thinks he’ll never get used to seeing that crisp grey, the stripe of achievements and the medal, no matter how well they suit him).

He’s seated at the edge of his bed, head in his hands, hunched over himself enough to look oddly _small_. It strikes an edge of fear in Keith and pushes him to stumble through the darkness to get to him.

“Shiro? Shiro, are you okay, what’s wrong?”

Shiro looks up and Keith freezes in his tracks.

He’s the very picture of _not okay_. Ashen face, panicked eyes, hair ruffled and sweaty like he’d awoken from a fever dream; Shiro looks terrible. He’s shivering, and Keith catches sight of his fingers, twitching and trembling out of his control, just before they’re hidden from his view, folded into the curl of fists.

“Keith...?”

“I-yeah! Yeah, it’s me,” Keith blurts, and he moves to sit beside him. He doesn’t anticipate it when Shiro flinches away from him, making an aborted motion before falling into stillness right after. Keith carefully straightens up and stares at him.

“What…what’s going on, Shiro?” he asks, confused and just a little scared.

“I-I’m sorry,” Shiro rasps, and it hurts, the way he’s avoiding looking at Keith suddenly, “Could you just- this isn’t…What date is it?”

The veer in the conversation (if they could call it that) is so abrupt, he takes a few seconds to respond.

“I-it’s the twenty-fifth,” And then, because Shiro’s face is disturbingly blank, “Twenty-fifth of April?”

Shiro emits a strangled sound as he closes his eyes; he shakes his head too quickly, too stilted and jerky to be anything but worrying.

“Right. Um. And…Kerberos? That-that’s soon, right?”

Keith has to fight the rising fear before he can bring himself to respond, and now he’s the one shaking his head too fast. “No, no, you’re leaving for the facility tonight…remember? Kerberos isn’t for another-”

“-two months,” Shiro murmurs, and there’s something wrong here, in how out of sorts he seems. It feels like he’s not meant to see this; Shiro, perfect Shiro, dissolving into himself in a mess of nerves.

“Shiro, what...are you alright?” It’s a dumb question that he cannot stop asking.

The older boy keeps scrubbing his hands over his face, his eyes, his hair, and Keith’s not sure he’s really listening.

It prickles at Keith, seeing him so unravelled.

The last time he’d seen Shiro this affected was also the only time it had happened. A phone call of garbled words from his mother (“Takashi-kun, your father-”) and he’d dressed up his fears under a severe cover of false composure, bid a quick farewell to Keith and rushed off home on the first flight out.

He’d been too late.

A week later, after the funeral, Shiro had returned to the Garrison. He’d been sombre and listless at first, but he’d smiled weakly for every stranger’s bland condolence, taking the grief in stride. And he’d thrown himself into his work with a fierceness that none had seen before, running himself ragged, until, in a fit of worry, Keith had taken him aside, shouted at him, and impulsively hugged him.

Shiro hadn’t moved for the stretch of three heartbeats, but when he did…he’d _shattered_ apart. He’d clung tight to Keith, fingers digging into the back of his jacket, heaving silent sobs, because even at his most vulnerable, he hadn’t wanted anyone to hear.

Keith never wants to see him like that again.

“Shiro, tell me what’s wrong,” he pleads, folding his legs beneath him to kneel on the floor. He’s half scared to touch him in case it provokes that odd reaction again, but he’s also too scared to not do so. The least he can do is be near him.

Shiro takes a deep breath, and another, before he‘s visibly reeling himself in, pushing down his panic with force. His face smoothens out as though the ripples of discontent had never marred it in the first place.

It’s eerily like watching a door being firmly shut.

When Shiro opens his eyes, all the storm clouds of earlier are wiped clean. And the smile; a sincere if self-deprecating curve, convincing enough to anyone who didn’t know Shiro.

Not the way Keith did.

That’s what prompts him to stand again and gingerly seat himself next to the older boy, leaving what he thinks is enough space between them to be acceptable for the moment.

“I’m fine,” Shiro says, and somehow, Keith’s knows he’s not really talking to anyone but himself. “That was…a little _weird_ , huh? Sorry about that, but I’m fine now.”

It sounds right. It sounds exactly like what Shiro would say, what he _has_ said before, countless times.

It sounds rehearsed.

“I think it’s just…all the stress,” Shiro continues with a soft huff, “I mean. Th-this is going to be the farthest humankind has ever travelled, we’re…we’re laying foundations for…further exploration here, and I’m-there’s so much that ha-could go wrong. I’m-”

Afraid.

The sound that leaves Keith’s lips is quiet enough that Shiro doesn’t hear him. There’s shock blooming wide in his chest, but it dissipates just as quickly, because…because of course. Of course he’s afraid.

Shiro hadn’t ever shown any indication of the kind of stress he must have been feeling since he’d begun his personalised training for the mission, more isolated from his classmates than ever. Topping it with all the expectations on his shoulders, all the pressure from every side and-

“You don’t want to go,” Keith whispers.

Shiro jolts and finally looks at him, and Keith sees the red rimmed eyes, the bags and stress lines that he’d hidden so well from the rest of them.

 _‘From me,’_ Keith thinks, but no, it wasn’t that. It was _Keith_ who hadn’t been looking hard enough, _Keith_ who had let his friend down. It sits in his stomach like a particularly heavy rock, brewing into a lump of sickness. Why hadn’t he noticed? Why hadn’t he seen it?

Shiro is shaking his head, but it’s sluggish, no energy left to pretend.

“I’m…no. This is, this is the opportunity I’ve been waiting for, I’ve…they’re expecting me to-”

“Shiro, stop.”

The silence is abrupt as Shiro goes quiet, ducking his head low. It takes a moment before he turns to meet his gaze, blazing purple to weary grey.

“Do you want to go on the Kerberos mission?” Keith asks.

“I…well I have to-”

“That’s not what I asked, Shiro.”

There’s a metric ton of emotions crossing Shiro’s face, and Keith wishes there were some light so he could understand them better. But there’s no way he’s leaving Shiro’s side just to go turn on a lamp.

Finally, Shiro sighs, tapping his boot against the floor a few times before he responds.

“I don’t want to go.”

Those words, coming from Shiro, are almost explosive in their depth. Keith struggles to not let his first reaction out, which is in effect, plenty of creative and unappreciated cursing. The Garrison had failed Shiro thus far, but Keith refuses to follow in those steps without a fight. So he lets his anger simmer and focuses on what’s more important.

“Don’t go then.”

It’s childish, his hope, that maybe things will work out if Shiro simply talks it out with the Brass; he knows that’s not how things work here. It’s why Shiro laughs, tight and sad in how insincere it is.

“You know I can’t do that.”

“There has to be some way,” Keith presses, frowning at Shiro, “Something, someone we can talk-“

“No, Keith. I mean, I _really_ can’t do that. I don’t have an option.”

The silence that follows that statement feels like the build-up before those scene that show up in every half-assed movie he’s ever seen, of the war-weary protagonist cornered by his audience of sceptics. There’s a meaningful speech here somewhere, encouraging and passionate, persuasive enough to magically imbue people with the strength and power needed to save the world.

But Keith is not that protagonist, and Shiro isn’t that audience. He doesn’t have a speech prepared and nor would he ever try one now, with how likely he is to stumble over his tongue. No one awaits a saviour like him to pull them out from the flames.

Here, they are just two boys sitting side-by-side in the dark, both lost in different ways to the pull of the stars.

He has nothing.

It’s almost terribly funny, how patient Shiro is being about this, when Keith is now the one panicking.

“But you said- I don’t understand.”

He doesn’t register Shiro moving until there’s a warm hand laid over his; the sudden touch is enough to startle him a little. He stares down at Shiro’s tanned fingers gripping his own tight and tries to remember how to breathe.

“I don’t know how to make you understand either, but…I have to do this. I know what I said earlier, about not wanting to go, I know you’re trying t-to protect me. I appreciate it,” and here Shiro grants him a look so fond and searing, it brings heat to Keith’s cheeks, “But this one, you’ll just have to let go buddy. Can you trust me on that?”

It’s the hardest thing - the _worst_ thing - that Shiro could ask of him. But seeing that earnestness directed at him, the determination Shiro had to apparently brush this away and take on the mission despite his misgivings…Keith could not deny him that.

“…just so you know, I am agreeing to this _very_ grudgingly, every cell of my body protesting otherwise.”

That’s what brings out the real smile, boyish and charming, his favourite smile in the world.

“Okay,” Shiro agrees, “I’ll make it up to you. When I get back of course.”

The brightness flickers, just for a moment, almost unnoticeable. Keith lets it slip this once.

“I’m holding you to that.”

They sit quietly for another moment, letting the silence soak in. Shiro doesn’t say anything, so Keith sighs and makes to stand up.

“Here, bet you haven’t eaten yet. I’ll go get you som-”

Shiro doesn’t release his hand, and Keith finds himself being tugged back to sit by him.

“Stay with me?” Shiro asks, voice soft and hopeful.

“But you haven’t ea-”

Keith cuts himself off, lets himself think over it before he gives in to the decision he’d made from the moment Shiro had held on to him.

“Okay.”

 

* * *

 

They sit together in the dark, dragging themselves up further onto the bed so they can lean against the wall, against each other. They ignore the increasing brightness outside their little bubble of comfort, ignore the fact that come morning, one of them wouldn’t be here anymore.

They talk about anything and everything, from the serious to the nonsensical, from the recent to the nostalgic.

There’s memories of pulling regrettable all-nighters, fuelled by coffee and sheer fortitude. (“Kei-” “You know you’d get your work done faster if you’d quit asking me to kill you, right?” “Well, where’s the fun in _that_?”)

Shiro’s impersonations of that one senior officer, squeaky outraged voice and all, those moments always ringed by Keith’s awed laughter. (“Do it again, please, come on Shiro!” “How _dare_ you presume to tell me what to do Cadet-” “Holy _shit_! How do you do that?!”)

The time Keith had singed his eyebrows off in an applied engineering class. (“You said you wouldn’t mention that ever again!” “Did I really? I can’t seem to recall.” “ _Shiro_.”)

Even the time Shiro had nearly broken his neck in a freak simulator incident and been laid up for days. (“If you ever do that again, Shirogane, I _swear_ -” “Hey, hey. Its okay, I’m okay. Ah, Keith. Come here.” “…You’re never getting into that simulator again. Not if I can help it.” “…If you say so.”)

It takes three hours before Shiro drifts off to sleep, his head dropping gently against Keith’s shoulder. Keith doesn’t dare move, just accommodates the weight and settles himself in, feeling soft hair brushing against his cheek, calm and even breathes wafting over his neck.

He doesn’t sleep.

* * *

 

When evening comes, he wakes Shiro up and they silently look at each other, knowing. Without a word, Shiro grabs his bags, packs the last few items that remain, hovering over them like he can extend time by slowing himself down. Keith bites his lips and joins him, handing him the last roll of a folded shirt.

And then they’re standing by the locked up door, Shiro palming the key, squinting out into the fluorescent lighting of the hallway.

This is it. They agreed to leave their farewells right here, where there’s less people, where there’s some semblance of privacy to let them have this much, at least.

Keith’s heart constricts; the smallest acknowledgement of the fact that he’s standing inches away from saying goodbye to the person who’s most important to him. The only person he loves, the only one he has left.

It’s not like he’s leaving permanently, of course not. But it sure feels like it.

Shiro turns to face him, smiling. But there’s something crucial shining in his eyes, something in the way he shifts his feet and clears his throat.

“Keith. Listen. I have to…um. Shit. How do I put this?”

Keith blinks, momentarily confused.

“What is it?”

Shiro inhales once, eyes flicking up to meet his, and it’s like he’s pinned under that gaze, seeing past it and into something more.

“I’m coming back to you.”

Keith’s brain fizzles out.

“What,” he catches himself say, as though from a distance. Blood pounds in his ears and he wonders if he heard wrong.

Shiro moves closer, a strange intensity to his motions that Keith hadn’t noticed before.

“I mean it. Keith, I need you to trust yourself, more than anything. No matter what they tell you, no matter what it looks like…Don’t believe it.”

“Shiro, what are you-”

Shiro leans forward, close, so close, and his lips brush against the corner of Keith’s mouth.

A hush falls over them as Keith stills, the honeyed air clinging to his lungs, only the quietest gasp escaping him. But Shiro doesn’t move in to kiss him properly, like he expects. He stays right where he is, lingering against Keith’s cheek, the whisper of words near inaudible as he speaks.

“Wait for me. I’ll see you on the other side, Keith.”

Then he’s pulling back, squeezing Keith’s hand one last time, with a kind of finality.

Keith watches him go, bags in hand, a mere silhouette by the time he turns the corner.

Ah, how wrong he’d been. Shiro asking him to leave things alone hadn’t been the hardest thing after all.

It was this, now, the aftermath of all he’d seen and heard from Shiro in the past few hours, and still having to let him go. To let him walk away.

Somehow, even so, he feels at ease.

 

* * *

 

Awareness comes quickly, before he’s even sure of it. Keith lies still in his bed, his chest heaving, reeling from the fragments of images flashing through his mind.

A dream?

His eyes flutter open and he sees the white-grey ceiling above him, the smooth walls, his room visible only by the blue glow of crystal-powered lights.

Clarity trickles in a moment later.

He lunges up from his bed with a cry and bolts out the door, not bothering with his boots. He runs down the hall barefooted, rushing past the wall-lanterns faster than they can flicker on upon registering his presence.

It hadn’t been a dream. It hadn’t been a dream, it _hadn’t_ been a dream, it hadn’t- how had he _forgotten_? It was all that had kept him-

When he reaches the right room, he wastes no time in beating a fist against the door.

“Allura! Allura, open up!”

Keith keeps banging and shouting until it slides open abruptly, nearly unbalancing him to the floor. Allura stands before him, hair bedraggled and sticking up amusingly on one side, the very opposite of her expression of alarm and concern.

“Keith, _what-_ ”

“I know where he is.”

There’s no need to clarify who he’s talking about. Allura straightens up, her spine stiffening as she regards him with clearer eyes.

“Where?” She doesn’t doubt him for a moment, and at any other point, Keith would be winded by that kind of trust, especially after the past few rough months they’d been through. But he’s too focused on his mission right now to mull it over.

“Earth,” he says, and then he’s rambling, stumbling over his words, “I saw him, in my dreams, except they weren’t dreams, they were memories. I don’t know how I forgot, it was the only thing that kept me going after Kerberos, he was acting like- it was him. He was there. He’s there, just…a year back? He’s…he’s back in-”

Allura grips his shoulder suddenly and Keith stops speaking, belatedly recognising the burning sensation in his eyes for what it is. The tension drains from him, leaving him to wilt. He leans into her touch and Allura holds him up easily, letting him draw comfort from her strength.

“We’ll bring him back,” she murmurs, voice fierce with her promise, “Tell me everything.”

**Author's Note:**

> You don't know how long I've been waiting to write this :DDDD  
> Comments feed my soul, constructive comments, my brain. And you guys: my heeeeart <3


End file.
